Floating
by Lucky MacGregor
Summary: Amidala returns to Naboo for the final time.


"When Padmé was a little girl, maybe about two or three, we were out walking around our garden. At the time, we had this little pond right in the center of it, with big beautiful lotus flowers floating all around. That's where we got her name, you know. The flowers. And it was perfect for her. She, like her sisters, loved the water. Always did. And she was beautiful. She was the prettiest little baby I'd ever laid eyes on."

"She wandered off. She was right by my side. I only turned my back for a second. And, when I turned back, she was gone. I remember calling her name, searching around the garden, over and under things, becoming more and more scared every moment I couldn't find her. Then I came to the pond."

"All I remember is her little body floating in the water. Face down. I...can't remember much after that. I know I jumped in. Pulled her out. Laid her down in the grass. Screamed for help. Beyond that, I don't know. But I'll never forget how blue her little face was. I was sure we'd lost her that day. What was I going to tell her mother? Then one of the gardeners – I don't remember who – took her into his arms. Patted her little back. Gave her breaths. Over and over. Finally, she coughed up all that water. Then she took a breath. Gods, I was never so happy to hear her cry."

Ruwee Naberrie looked down at his daughter's pale, lifeless face. Her eyes were dark and sunken, her lips now a sickening shade of blue.

"I keep expecting her to wake up again," he said, not breaking his gaze. "I keep telling myself that this is some horrible nightmare. That this isn't real. I just can't believe she -"

He lowered his eyes, stopping at the very noticeable swell of Padmé's belly under the stark plainness of her long-sleeved hospital gown. The austerity of the white gown contrasted the ornateness of the many headdresses and fancy outfits she wore throughout her painfully short life and only served to make the loss all that much more real.

"They're," he corrected himself, his voice cracking with the unmistakable pain of a parent forced to bury their child. "Really gone. And I couldn't protect them. I failed as her father. I failed her again."

He met the gaze of an auburn-haired Jedi sitting in a chair beside the gurney. The Jedi, much like his daughter, was dressed very plainly in shades of white and brown, save for the glint of silver coming from the two lightsabers on his belt. Jedi were famous for being calm and level-headed and controlling their emotions through years of practice and meditation, but at this moment Ruwee saw something very different.

The man's eyes were bloodshot and puffy, as if he too had been crying. His robes were wrinkled and disheveled, the cream-colored garments under the robes smeared with what Ruwee prayed was dirt. He was tired, as if he hadn't slept in days, and he appeared to be deep in thought.

"Have you ever loved anyone, Kenobi?"

The Jedi didn't answer right away. He appeared to be in his own little world.

"Kenobi?"

Obi-Wan snapped back to reality.

"I'm sorry, what?"

"Tell me she wasn't alone. Were you there with her, at the...end," Ruwee asked, unable to bring himself to say that word.

Dead. His little girl, the brown-haired beauty who saved an entire planet and won the heart of an entire galaxy and a certain young Jedi knight, was dead.

Obi-Wan cast his gaze downward and gave a small nod.

"Did she...feel anything?"

"No," he lied, trying to bring what little comfort he could to the grieving father.

He'd rehearsed the story over and over on the flight to Naboo. Padmé had been killed by some unknown assassin in the chaos of the Republic's fall. Shot straight through the heart, and dead before she hit the floor. By the time Obi-Wan had reached her, it was far too late. This was the story the now-Emperor Palpatine was telling to the galaxy, and this was the story Obi-Wan now had to stick to. As much as he hated it, and as dirty and dishonorable as it made him feel, he couldn't tell Ruwee that his daughter had died giving birth and his two newborn grandchildren were safely aboard the starship behind him.

"_On this lie, everything depends," _Yoda told him before he stepped off the ship, the gurney carrying Padmé's body floating beside him. _"Our last hope, these children are. Protect them, we must." _

In this moment, Obi-Wan thanked the gods Ruwee couldn't see inside his mind.

"I have something of hers," he said quietly, unsure of what else to say. "I think you should have it."

He reached into his robes and pulled out a small, simple leather chain. Attached to the end was a small piece of wood smoothed to perfection and carved with strange symbols Obi-Wan didn't know the meaning of. But he knew it was important to Padmé, and felt the best thing to do was hand it over to her family.

Ruwee made a fist around the pendant as fresh tears began to pour from his eyes.

"What am I going to tell her mother?"

Once again, Padmé floated in a bed of serene blues and greens. Her chocolate-colored curls lay perfectly fanned underneath her, peppered by ribbons and little white flowers. Her face was peaceful, her body still. In her hands was her treasured amulet. Where she got it, no one knew. It was a secret Padmé would soon take to her grave.

The sun was setting on the city of Theed and the sky turned from a cerulean blue to a mixture of purples and pinks, oranges and blues. Thousands of people lined the streets and, save for the occasional murmur here and there or the whimper of an impatient and tired child followed by a mother's shushing, the crowd stood in mournful silence. As was tradition, each family held a lantern, each flame representing the gods' eternal presence and the immortality of the spirit.

To the people, Amidala was a kind, just ruler who saved her planet from annihilation. She was the kindhearted young senator who fought for justice the best way she knew how. And, in the end, she was a bright light that was tragically extinguished long before her time.

But while everyone else saw the young queen in heavy white makeup and the straight-laced senator fighting for the forgotten across the galaxy, the mourners walking behind her saw beyond that. Her handmaidens saw a kindred soul that each and every one of them would be willing to die for. Her older sisters saw the bright-eyed little girl who would chase them with buckets of lake water and dump them on them, her squeals of delight echoing as they returned the favor. Jar Jar Binks and Boss Nass remembered a girl who united a world. And her parents, her parents...there was just too much there to think about, let alone unpack.

Today, they buried two of their babies. One, whose life was cut short in the cruelest of ways. And the other, who never lived life at all.

The procession stopped at the mausoleum where Padmé would ultimately be entombed forever. The clock tower in the middle of the city's square let out a low, mournful series of chimes, each one punctuating a year in her life.

_One. _

She toddled about her family's garden, babbling and squealing with delight as small animals scurried across the yard.

_Two._

She wanted to be a princess, and then a bird, and then an astromech droid.

_Seven. _

_Eight. _

_Eleven._

_Fourteen. _

She stood before the crowd of onlookers inside the great hall of Theed's palace, in heavy makeup and ornate robes, the newly appointed leader of her people. Her dark brown eyes looked out at no one in particular as she took a deep breath and began a new chapter in her life. __

_Nineteen. _

_Twenty-four. _

She'd come back to Naboo, bringing her handsome Jedi protector with her. __

_Twenty-seven. _

And with that, their beloved Padmé – the light of their lives, their bright-eyed water baby – was carried to her final resting place.


End file.
